If you wanted a crash course in the biggest issue facing the state so far this century, there was no better place to be Thursday than the Florida Water Forum in Orlando.

Expect water to be the most dominant item on the Florida Legislature's 2017 agenda. And for that reason, the 7th Annual Florida Water Forum beginning at 1 p.m. today at Loew's Royal Pacific Hotel and Resort in Orlando has already captured the attention of business leaders, lawmakers, scientists and environmentalists -- people looking to solve the critical water issues Florida faces right now.

It should surprise no one that Floridians have wised up to the costly and ineffective "tough on crime" philosophy that dominated state policy a quarter century ago.

On Monday, the James Madison Institute and Charles Koch Institute jointly released a poll that overwhelmingly supports criminal justice reform.

Social media lit up like a Christmas tree Saturday after Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton's subdued, even sleepy response to a bomb that went off in midtown Manhattan, injuring more than two dozen New Yorkers.

Was she drugged? Is there something wrong with this picture? You be the judge. Watch the video here or at the end of this story, recorded aboard her plane Saturday night.

A GOP super-PAC is using Democrat Joe Garcia's secretly recorded sexist remark about Hillary Clinton last Sunday as a springboard to remind voters of Garcia's scandal-plagued record. And the campaign is just getting started. It has all kind of  tricks up its sleeve for the former congressman who narrowly beat Annette Taddeo in the Democratric primary.

Here's a poll you won't see widely in Florida mainstream media -- because, frankly, the press is either in deep denial or it's looking for a way to smear it in lipstick. But here it is, released Wednesday by Gallup:  "Americans' trust and confidence in the mass media 'to report the news fully, accurately and fairly' has dropped to its lowest level in Gallup polling history, with 32 percent (of respondents) saying they have a great deal or fair amount of trust in the media."

I'm sorry, but the president of the Florida League of Women Voters doesn't get to brag about the organization's "integrity and credibility."

Justice James E.C. Perry's mandatory retirement from the Florida Supreme Court will give conservative Gov. Rick Scott his first opportunity in nearly seven years to make an appointment to the high court.

He's chairman of the Broward Democratic Party, a frequent guest analyst on national network news shows, a consummate party man who had been re-elected chairman repeatedly since the 1990s in contentious races against serious opponents.

If the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee isn't bailing on behinder-and-behinder candidate Patrick Murphy, why have they suddenly dropped Florida as a target state?